Pictures of the civil rights movement are in black and white even though color photography existed for decades. They’re only in black and white to make kids think it was longer ago than it was.
They are in black ad white because that was what was frequently used for newspapers and stuff. Color film was often not as clear and the color tech they used was very hard to use with dark skin. So action shots of a march or speech ae just esier to do in black and white at the time.
Schools definitely like to pretend that its over and thats probably why they dont show any color pictures, as there were almost definitely color portraits of MLK and stuff, but the tech was actually a surprisingly limited factor as well.
Pictures of the civil rights movement are in black and white even though color photography existed for decades. They’re only in black and white to make kids think it was longer ago than it was.
They are in black ad white because that was what was frequently used for newspapers and stuff. Color film was often not as clear and the color tech they used was very hard to use with dark skin. So action shots of a march or speech ae just esier to do in black and white at the time.
Schools definitely like to pretend that its over and thats probably why they dont show any color pictures, as there were almost definitely color portraits of MLK and stuff, but the tech was actually a surprisingly limited factor as well.
Thanks to everyone pointing out that teaching racism was more expensive if it was in color. Thanks for missing the point.
Edit: There are color photos of the civil rights movements, but my middle school textbooks chose to only use the black and white ones of people getting shot with fire hoses and beaten with billy clubs. Every other page of this hard bound textbook had color pictures in it, so saying it would cost more is a straw man argument. Strange coincidence. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/06/20/fact-check-most-civil-rights-era-images-werent-made-color/3210472001/